Monday, July 04, 2011

These past months in the wilderness, I guess I hoped someone might take up the slack. Or even that Rita Redshoes music might percolate beyond her native Portugal. You may recall me raving about her last album and this one has been out a while. I just realised that I hadn’t written about it and that’s very remiss of me. Better late than never is not an excuse.

We all read acres of press about artists that really don’t come anywhere near this girl in terms of scope. Or for that matter sophistication of being able to juggle styles. The fact that she, and Annika Norlin aren’t on their way to becoming global household names says much more about the consumer than it does about either songbook.

Always literate and sidestepping any pigeonhole by some considerable distance, there’s something about this that reminds me of Cristina. You remember that Ze records artist that covered “Is That all there Is”? I think it’s the sonic glamour of the sound. This girl thinks big and across several palettes. “Which One Is The Witch” and “You Should Go” are just two examples of how far ahead of the curve Rita is. This spacious pop that doesn’t rely on some recognition with the past. As much as I appreciate being reminded of Dusty Springfield, I’m a little tired of the endless parade that seems to rely on that familiarity.

I guess that an appearance on “Later” might light a fire below her career here. A couple of well-placed shows outside of the conventional bunfight. All I know is that this is a cut above whatever hipster-sanctioned collection that’ll be in vogue anytime soon.

Thanks for all that. I'll check them out. Believe me, the "anglo-saxon" are too busy creating rubbish when the rest of the world - including Portugal - is producing great stuff. But how to educate these people? Hopefully this is a small start.

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A wee bit of background, etc.

This all kicked off as a print (Xerox) magazine in 1977 and now it's on the interweb. Named after the title track on The Dictators Go Girl Crazy (40 years old in 2015) the purpose has always been to uphold what’s good and pure and right in terms of rock’n’roll and its satellites.

It has nothing, nada, nowt to do with any festival(s) that devalue our namesake so don't send mp3's or anything else with regard to setting course for a career in the music business or anywhere else.

Take a look at what goes on here and if you think your fare fits then drop a line and maybe we can work something out.

I plan to put PDFs of all physical issues up here eventually and in addition, all Rockin’ Bones, Watch This and Fuzzbuzz.Maybe Psychedelic Basement, etc from Sounds too so that everything is in one place. Some of the quality of the source material isn’t terribly good but it’s all I have to work with. It will take some time. The 3 page pilot issue, “NBT 0” from September 1976 never survived as far as I know. Some of the content is a wee bit embarrassing at this juncture but every journey has to start someplace, right?